


Lost and Found

by MS_Garlit



Category: Critical Role (Web Series)
Genre: Angst with a Happy Ending, Could Be Canon, Don't say I didn't warn you, Episode 69, F/M, First Kiss, Hurt/Comfort, Slight Canon Divergence, Spoilers, i am trash, seriously don't read this if you haven't watched the new episode, this is the only way I survived last night's episode, yes I am still writing tags
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-06-28
Updated: 2019-06-28
Packaged: 2020-05-28 14:19:26
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,411
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19395907
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/MS_Garlit/pseuds/MS_Garlit
Summary: *** SPOILERS FOR EPISODE 69***Jester and the rest of the Mighty Nein get out of the temple, and rest for the evening. However, after the days terrors and heartbreak, Jester finds herself unable to sleep. And, oddly enough, someone else didn't feel like sleeping either.





	Lost and Found

**Author's Note:**

> Hiya!!! So THAT episode happened... 
> 
> After such a shall we say "emotional" episode, I had to write something.
> 
> This is my first time posting a fic, so please be gentle with me <3
> 
> Hope yall like it <3 <3 <3

“FJORD!” Jester screamed, as he practically fell into her arms, slipping through the door right before they closed behind him.

“Jester," was all he had a chance to sigh out as Caduceus pressed a gentle hand to Fjord’s back healing some of the wounds that covered every inch of him.

Despite the healing touch of their friend, Fjord leaned on Jester heavily as they made it through the caverns, room after room of tortures that they’d spent hours getting through, they all passed in a matter minutes. Some pensive, some in tears, as a tense silence enveloped the Mighty Nein.

When they finally made it out of the temple, what was left of the party dissolved into conflict.

“But what about Yasha?” Jester begged time after time, as the party spoke around her.

“How do we know that wasn’t the real Yasha in there? She smiled at me Jester. She knew what she was doing and grinned,” Fjord said, wincing as he leaned against the rock face of the pyramid, looking at her intensely. 

Jester had never seen Fjord like this before. He was so mad and upset and hurt—he still was covered in so much blood—that he was hardly recognizable.

“Fjord, that wasn’t her in there—“ Jester felt her throat closing around another sob.

“How do you know? She’s always been quiet with us. She might’ve been playing us this whole time. Telling us she didn’t remember so we would help her release…whatever the hell that was. How could we have been so stupid? We were so stupid—“ Fjord’s pounded a hand against the rock beside him.

Jester ringed her hands, trying to keep them from reaching out for Fjord again. He looked so hurt, she wished she could help, but her spells had been depleted during the fight, “She was mind controlled, just like what happened with Caleb. It could happen!”

“Fjord, we weren’t stupid,” Beau finally spoke up, placing a hand on Fjord shoulder. In Jester’s worry over Fjord, she hadn’t noticed until then just how bad Beau looked as well. A new swell of guilt struck Jester, as tears welled up in her eyes.

The rest of the party agreed on something or other, while Jester fought back sobs as she remembered her last conversation with Yasha

_“We’ll keep you safe, okay? Pinky promise,” Jester had said, extending a pinky out for Yasha._

_Yasha fought against a soft smile, mirroring Jester’s movement, “Yeah, okay…Thank you, Jester.”_

As they saddled up in silence, Jester didn’t even realize that Fjord had mounted Yarnball behind her until he’d cleared his throat, “Jester, can you send a message to anyone right now?”

Another wave of guilt hit, threatening to swallow her whole. She fought back tears answering him, “Not right now. I’m… not right now, no.”

“Oh,” was his staccato response, making Jester’s guilt swell up even greater.

“But if I could, I’d be talking to Yasha…,” tears welled up in her eyes again, as she fought down a sob,

“That’s what I wanted to do, too... I wanted to know if... if that was really her in there…,” Fjord said, for a second time.

Jester wanted to scream: _NO! IT WASNT! IT WASNT HER! WE KNOW HER! I KNOW HER!!!_

But Beau spoke up first, saying something just as concise but in a better way—Beau was sooooo much better at words than Jester, even when her heart must’ve been hurting just as much—that silenced Fjord.

The rest of the journey back into Bazzoxan was in silence. And if Fjord held onto Jester closer than usual on way back, she barely noticed.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

“YASHA!!!!” Jester cried out, as Yasha watched them, the doors closing.

But this time, at Jester’s voice something clicked. The murder in Yasha’s eyes was gone, replaced with recognition and uncertainty. But most of all Fear. And the doors where closing in faster.

Yasha reached out for Jester as Jester cried out her name again, almost touching. And then the doors slammed shut.

“She recognized me! She knew me! We have to go back! We can’t leave her alone in there with it! We can’t, we can’t, we can’t…" Jester screamed at the party, as they ran out into the darkness, as Jester continued to sit in front of the angel door hearing Yasha pound away at the other side.

When she turned back to the rest of the group, they were gone. They’d left Jester just like they’d left behind Yasha

And then the Laughing Hand’s arm burst through the wall, grabbing Jester by the throat—

Jester gasped awake, still feeling the immortal’s hand around her throat. Her breathing was hard as she looked around the group slowly.  They were all still here. At least, all the ones who had exited the temple earlier that afternoon.  Jester wasn’t alone.

“Jessie?” came Fjord’s whisper from across the dome, his amber eyes catching in the moonlight. “You okay?”

Jester fought back the _“no, I’m awful,”_ that sat on the edge of her tongue as she grabbed her blanket and sat down next to him. 

“Can’t sleep either?” Fjord asked, softly, not looking away from the night sky above them.

“We left her, Fjord. We left behind one of the team,” Jester said, pressing her face into her knees, pulling them tight into her chest. 

“I’ll take that as a no, then,” came his reply, a mirthless chuckle following. "If it makes you feel any better, I’m upset, too.”

Now that ruffled Jester’s feathers. She couldn’t keep the sharpness out of her whisper as she glared over at him, “Oh really? Because it seemed to me back there like you were perfectly fine with leaving her, you know! You sounded like you didn’t think she was a good person, and she is! She was—is the best person! Yes, she’s quiet but she’s good! I know it! We talked, you know! She wouldn’t betray us, she wouldn’t leave us—“

“She’s always leaving us Jester! She left us right after Molly…“ Fjord’s face crumpled slightly at the mention of their other lost friend. The other one that they hadn’t been able to save.

_No, we can still save Yasha. She’s still alive! She’s just stuck in there. When we’re all better, we can save her! We can rescue her_ , Jester thought briefly before responding to Fjord, with what she hoped was confidence.

“That was different. She was different then. We all were. But since then, she’s been with us for a long time and now you keep saying that she’s evil and bad. But she’s not! She really isn’t! I would know!”

“Jester, I was trying to get her out. I tried so damn hard to get her out with us. You didn’t see that look in her eye when she hit me…” Fjord’s voice faded into quietness.

Jester’s breath caught. She hadn’t known that it was Yasha, that Yasha had been the one…

He continued, his voice soft, “I don’t often appreciate my heritage, but, if it weren’t for the Orc in me, I wouldn’t be out here with you. She would’ve killed me…"

At that, Jester started sobbing, pressing her hands up to her face.

She’d seen how bad Fjord looked coming out of the doors, but she hadn’t known how truly bad he’d been. She could’ve lost him. No rituals, no spells could’ve helped, no matter how hard she cried out for the Traveller. She would’ve lost Fjord. Yasha might be trapped with a monster, but she was alive. 

Fjord pulled Jester into his chest, letting her tears soak the top of his shirt. Her fingers dug into his back, needing to bring him closer. To make for certain that he really was here in front of her. 

Once she’d quieted down some, the wave of embarrassment hit her. 

“I’m sorry, Fjord,” she said, wiping at her eyes as she pulled away, looking everywhere but at his amber eyes. “I know how uncomfortable you get around, you know, crying and here I was crying like a big baby. Sooooo, I’m sorry.”

“No it’s all right,” he said after a moment, glancing back up at the stars.

Jester glanced up at them, too, trying to calm her toiling emotions.

“You know, before I met the group, I thought I’d be sailing for the rest of my days, until a bad storm and washed us and our cargo away—“ he whispered, eyes not leaving the sky.

“Fjord, that’s suuuuuper morbid,” Jester replied, leaning her head on her knees to look at him.

He chuckled, “It’s been a morbid kind of day,” he continued, “But then I got my falchion, and I lost Vandren... and those first few weeks, I didn’t know what to think. I’d almost died out there in the waves, and—with Vandren gone—I realized, no one was going to mourn me if I died. That if I died, no one was going to care. No one would shed a single damn tear.”

Jester stayed silent, as she watched him continue

“And then I met you,” Fjord looked at her now, eyes as unreadable as ever. Jester’s heart was beating quickly, “And here you are, crying for me almost dying.”

“The rest of the Nein would cry for you too, you know. They care too,” Jester heard herself squeak out. 

“Not like you do. You care so much for every single one of us,” he continued, eyes not leaving her.

Jester fidgeted, looking down at the grass at her feet, “Well, we all care about each other. That’s what we do. That’s how we work. We’re family, you know.”

“Yeah, that’s true. But Jester you care about all of us: you care about Nott enough to take her flask—“ Fjord continued.

Her eyes shot back up to his, “How did you—“

“I _did_ notice her magically having it back after your chat with her in the mirror hallway,” Fjord gave her a slight grin, before continuing, “And how you tease Caleb into being less serious. And you defend Yasha… and you cry for me.”

“Well, I…" her stomach was doing somersaults. He was staring at her, his attention fully absorbed by her. She felt her tail twist around on the ground behind her. It wasn’t a _bad_ feeling, but Jester just…she didn’t know how to deal with it right now. Not with tears staining her face and one of their friends taken.

“You know, as I almost went down, I had a last blurry thought,” he said, drawing her attention back to him. 

“Was it of the ocean? I think mine would probably be of the ocean if my god was, you know, a big ocean serpent thing?” Jester heard herself blurt out too quickly, voice a tad too high.

Fjord laughed, a deep seated chuckle that twisted up Jester’s spine,“No, it was not the ocean. It was about something blue though.”

Jester sighed dramatically, giving Fjord a fierce glare, “Fjooooord, you know how much I hate ‘I Spy’. Whenever I play it on the road with Beau, you know that I am soooooo bad at it…"

Fjord chucked again, rubbing his hand over his face before looking back at Jester with a smile.

She blabbered on, motivated to move this conversation along. It was always easiest to be around Fjord when she was telling him stories, “What? It’s true! It’s like the worst game ever because Mama and the other girls in the Chateau would always play with me and because I was stuck in my room all day, I couldn’t think of anything super cool for ‘I Spy’, so I’d have to make up something and it’s hard for someone to guess something if they can’t see what you made up and—“ 

Fjord’s hand pressed her face to his and he kissed her.

_He_ kissed _her_.

_Oh my god, Traveler he’s kissing me! He’s kissing me!!!!_ Jester thought happily as she leaned into the kiss feeling the pressure of his tusks gently on her lips.

After a moment Fjord pulled back, his expression shy and soft.

“Fjord, were you just trying to shut me up?” Jester teased, enjoying the fact that he hadn’t taken his hand back from her neck.

“Not entirely no,” Fjord chuckled, before leaning his forehead against the top of her head, careful to avoid her horns. “But yeah, that’s what I thought about before almost going under.”

“About wanting to shut me up?” Jester teased, pulling away to give Fjord a shocked expression.

“Noooooo,” he replied, a soft smile on his lips as his cheeks darkened a little, “You really want me to say it out loud huh?”

“Mayyyyyybe,” Jester teased, feeling her tail thump the ground behind her happily.

“Well, huh,” Fjord started, clearing his throat before looking back at her,” I thought about how much I wanted to kiss you. How I couldn’t believe I was about die without having kissed you.”

Jester’s heart beat furiously in her chest, as she bit her lower lip, trying to conceal the huge smile that was breaking apart her face, _Oh my gosh, Traveler, he has been wanting to kiss me._

“Well, you aren’t dead. And none of the rest of us are either so, you know, I think we should celebrate that,” Jester said, getting up on her knees and wrapping her arms around his neck.

“I guess that is something to celebrate huh?” Fjord wrapped his arms around her waist and pulled her into his lap to sit across his legs.

“And we might, you know, all get hurt or almost die again soon, because you know we have to save Yasha and the rest of Xhorhous from the Laughing Undead Guy,” Jester continued, enjoying the feeling of being this close to Fjord.

“Now which one of us is the morbid one,” he continued, looking down at her with amusement as she playfully smacked him in the chest.

“That guy, was like super hard to fight because of all those mouths, so I think, just in case, we should DEFINITELY make out some more, just so, you know, you won’t have anymore regrets, or something like that,” Jester continued, gesturing with her hand absentmindedly.

“Jester, just kiss me already,” Fjord said, pulling her in for another kiss, this time deeper, much to Jester’s delight.

Shit may have gone very bad for the Nein today, but for Jester something had finally gone very right.


End file.
